McKenna: We'll Enjoy Getting Back Out There On Saturday Friday, 14th Apr 2023 17:19 Town host Charlton Athletic on Saturday aiming to return to winning ways after Easter Monday’s frustrating 1-1 draw at Cheltenham. The Blues go into Saturday’s match third in the League One table, two points behind leaders Sheffield Wednesday, but having played a game fewer than the South Yorkshiremen, and one off Plymouth in second. Barnsley in fourth trail Town by four points. Town’s winning eight-game winning streak was brought to an end on Monday when they were held by the Robins, while their goal also curtailed the clean sheet run at nine matches and the Blues’ spell without conceding at 949 minutes, both new club records. Despite the disappointment of failing to win at Whaddon Road, McKenna says the squad has been in good spirits this week. “The energy has been good,” he said. “There are so many games and it is such a busy month, we are not going to win every game. “As much as we will try with everything we’ve got to win every game, the laws of probability say we won’t.  “We went away from home on Easter Monday, had 23/24 shots to six away from home, high 60s possession, much more chances, much more domination in the game. “It was a performance that will get us a win more often than not. We took the positives, we took a couple of bits that we could do better, and we move on quickly to Charlton.” While Town are hosting the Addicks, their three rivals for automatic promotion are all away from home. The Owls are at Burton Albion, the Pilgrims face Exeter in a big Devon derby at St James’ Park at lunchtime and they Tykes are at bottom side Forest Green Rovers. Remarkably, the four teams have all taken 61 points from their last 30 games with the Blues having the better goal difference.  Charlton are 10th in the League One table, neither challenging for the play-offs nor threatened by relegation. Nevertheless, Town boss McKenna doesn’t anticipate facing a team which has downed tools for the summer. “I wouldn’t expect their players to see this as a dead rubber for Charlton,” he said. “There is always so much to play for individually, in terms of your own career and making an impression and fighting for your future in the game — as it is so competitive. “There are only so many shirts available out there on a Saturday and I think every player knows how lucky they are to have one, whether that’s for us or for Charlton. “It is an opportunity and a challenge, there’s pressure and you have to go out there and give your best — there’s no doubt about that. “They have a new manager as well who has had a good start and made a good impact there. “They will be going out to try and impress him and make sure they are in the picture for the team for next season. We know what to expect from Charlton. We know their qualities as a team and we will be ready for that.”
The sides previously met at the Valley in October when a remarkable game ended 4-4 with four goals netted in injury time. McKenna says he’s looked back at that match this week but not to any great extent with the Addicks now under different management, Dean Holden having succeeded Ben Garner following the current Colchester boss’s sacking in December. “A little bit,” he said. “There are other games we focus on more because Charlton have new personnel and a new manager. There are other games that are more tactically relevant. “But like with all games, we watch back bits we think are going to be relevant to the next one. There are a few little bits from that I think we can take, but other than that, there are new players on both sides, a new manager on their side, we are playing at home and not away - I don’t think there will be massive comparisons from a tactical point of view. “I don’t think there were any key lessons looking back, not in relation to the game coming up in particular. “When you have such an emotional game - we were ahead, got pegged back, went back ahead and then they scored really late — you learn from those games in general. “It was a one-off and a wonderful game, if you are a neutral, and an unique game in that I’m not sure if I will ever be involved in a game like that again. “There were lessons there to be learned in terms of how we managed certain situations. But that’s more for our development as a team rather than playing Charlton again.” “It will be nice to see him, of course,” McKenna said. “He has a great affiliation with the club and the supporters as an Ipswich fan and because of his really good efforts when he played here last season. It will be nice for everyone to see him. “Of course, our focus will be on Ipswich and trying to stop him and Charlton’s other forwards and he will be trying to help the team he is currently at to win the game. “But no doubt about it, he’s a good person and a good player. Hopefully, Saturday will not go his way, but other than that, I’m sure everyone in Ipswich will want to continue seeing him do well.” Also in the side will be Jes Rak-Sakyi, who is on loan with Charlton for the season from Crystal Palace and has been one of the outstanding young players in the division during 2022/23. The 20-year-old forward, who was on Town’s list of potential January recruits, is nominated alongside Blues midfielder Cameron Humphreys for the EFL Young Player of the Year award. “He’s had a very good season, no doubt about it,” McKenna said. “It’s a big step from U21 football, he’s probably only one of the players you can say has stepped from U21s and had a massive impact. “To move up to League One level is a big step to make and he has made that step very well. We know he is a talented player and someone we have to be ready for.” “He’s somebody who made contact a few years ago when he was first-team coach at Bristol City, maybe just before he went into the manager’s role there and I was coaching at [Manchester] United,” The Blues boss recalled. “He made contact and we had some good conversations about coaching and processes and methodologies. “A really good person, a few people at the the club know him from Bristol City and everyone speaks highly of him as a person and that’s certainly been my interactions with him as well. “Good to see him get the opportunity at Charlton, at a big club who haven’t had an easy couple of years but a really big club and a good opportunity for him as a manager. “A good person, everyone in the game speaks very highly of him and after Saturday we can, of course, wish him well, but all eyes on Saturday, we’ll be trying to get the result for our own clubs.” Do the pair have similar footballing philosophies? “We didn’t really have discussions about playing styles and things like that, we were both pretty early in our careers and chatting about training, processes, training weeks and meeting structures and things like that. “I didn’t see much of his team at Bristol City. Of course, I’ve watched a lot of Charlton games now and some of the things he’s implementing there and he’s done well since he came in, so we know he’ll have them well prepared and ready to come and give us a challenge, and we’ll be ready for them.” Quizzed on whether the Addicks have changed much under his management, he added: “It’s always a process. You can see it from the outside looking in that it’s always a balance between how quickly you can make changes and keeping the consistency with what the squad’s been built for and brought in to do and what they’ve been training at since the start of pre-season. “You can see they’ve changed shape a few times and he’s now learning about the players and what suits them and what they can do well. They’ve been pretty flexible in terms of changing shape, so I think their strengths are still their strengths, their key players are still their key players. “And that’s something that we’ve looked at and we’re ready for and we’ll do our best to try and stop them while also giving them problems in the areas that we can.”
Town, who will confirm that they can finish no lower than sixth if they win on Saturday, will again be watched by a home sell-out crowd. McKenna says he and his players relish stepping out in front of the Portman Road crowd at present. “That’s the mentality that we’re trying to have and the performances that we keep trying to put on so we can maintain that feeling,” he said. “I’ve said that every time, that it’s a privilege to be at the club at this moment when we have such fantastic support and the connection is really special between everyone inside the club and the supporters and the players and everyone involved in Ipswich. “It’s a really good time to be here. We want to keep enjoying the journey, like we’ve said all along. “Of course, we want to have a successful end to the season but we have to enjoy each game as we go along because wherever you are, you have to enjoy the moments when you’re playing for or coaching or managing a big, fantastic football club and a good team that’s working hard and fighting for something. “We’ll enjoy getting back out there tomorrow, everyone’s looking forward to the game and we’ll do everything we can to keep delivering performances that the supporters enjoy, that they want to come back and see and give us a good chance to win games.” McKenna will almost certainly stick with what’s become his go-to team in recent weeks with Christian Walton in goal and Harry Clarke on the right of the defence alongside Luke Woolfenden and Cameron Burgess. Leif Davis looks set to continue on the left despite having a couple of minor fitness issues, while Wes Burns will be wide on the right. Skipper Sam Morsy and Massimo Luongo will be the central midfielders with 22-goal top scorer Conor Chaplin one of the number 10s. Nathan Broadhead seems likely to return as the other having missed the Cheltenham game due to his ankle problem, but if not McKenna will decide between Marcus Harness, Kyle Edwards or perhaps Sone Aluko to partner Chaplin. On-loan Leicester man George Hirst will be the central striker. Charlton have won four of their last six including a 3-2 win at home to Burton on Monday. and a 6-0 hammering of Shrewsbury at the start of the month. Although they were beaten 1-0 at Bristol Rovers in their most recent away fixture between those two victories, they had won their two previous games on the road, 2-1 at Cambridge and before that 4-1 at Morecambe. Overall on their travels in League One this season, the South Londoners have won six, drawn six and lost eight.
Charlton will assess right-back Sean Clare and forward Miles Leaburn prior to the game, while they will be without midfielder Jack Payne, who is suspended having been red-carded in the dying minutes of the Burton match, and on-loan Blues full-back Matt Penney, who is ineligible against his parent club. Centre-half Lucas Ness (knee), winger Corey Blackett-Taylor (hamstring) and striker Chuks Aneke (hamstring) all remain sidelined. Addicks manager Holden, who was previously appointed Bristol City manager by Town CEO Mark Ashton having been assistant to Lee Johnson, is not at all shocked the Blues are in the hunt for an automatic place. “It’s an exciting challenge for us, with the run we have been in recently,” Holden told the South London Press. “I know Ipswich had a slight sticky patch but they have come through that unbelievably well with the recent run they have been on. “They had eight wins and were looking to get nine for the record, held by Sir Bobby Robson, last weekend. That shows you the form they have been in. “It’s not a surprise they are up there. Everybody talks about the finances, salaries they have paid and the fees they have brought players in for. That is there for all to see and what people focus on. “But I look a bit deeper. Kieran McKenna, in his first job, has done an excellent job up to now. He’s someone I got to know quite well when he was at Manchester United. “I got in touch with him a few years back when I was at Bristol City, when I was on my own journey — tapping into the brains of young coaches. He had a different type of pedigree coming in. He was at Loughborough University. He played at Tottenham as a kid but had an injury. “It’s just an interesting story. He came from Tottenham to Manchester United and then very quickly was utilised at first-team level by Jose Mourinho and Ole Gunnar Solskjaer. “Effectively he became the brains of the operation while Ole was in charge as manager, I found that quite fascinating because I think he was only in his early thirties at the time. “I picked his brains and vice-versa, we had some good conversations. He was a good help to me, on a personal level. It’s great to see him doing well. “It’s a magnificent club. Despite the fees and salaries paid, you still have to build a successful team and go and win games of football — they have done that consistently, which is why they are where they are. “It will be a big challenge for us, no doubt about that — 30,000 inside Portman Road. It will be good for our players, particularly the young ones, to go and experience that. Let’s see if we can get another result and keep on this decent run we’ve been on.” The Blues, who have scored four goals in each of their last two games against the South Londoners, just have the edge historically having won 24 games (20 in the league), Charlton 20 (17) and with 13 (12) ending in draws. At the Valley in October, Town twice let two-goal leads slip in a bizarre, topsy-turvy game which ended 4-4 with four goals in injury time. George Edmundson and Tyreece John-Jules put the Blues 2-0 in front but the Addicks hit back through Rak-Sakyi and and Albie Morgan. However, in injury time, Town restored their two-goal advantage through Freddie Ladapo and skipper Morsy but Terell Thomas and George Dobson netted in the sixth and ninth minutes of the additional time to claim a remarkable point for the home side. On the final day of last season at Portman Road, Burns scored twice and Tyreeq Bakinson and James Norwood once each as Town thrashed Charlton 4-0. Bakinson gave the Blues the lead with a superb strike on seven, Burns added the second four minutes later, then scored the third five minutes into the second half, before the departing Norwood signed off with the fourth with two minutes remaining. Blues striker Joe Pigott, who is on loan at Portsmouth for the season, began his career with the Addicks and made four starts and 12 sub appearances without scoring having made his debut in August 2013 before moving on in the summer of 2016 following a number of loan spells. Midfielder Scott Fraser joined Charlton from the Blues in January last year having only moved to Town from the MK Dons last summer. The Scot made 18 starts and two sub appearances for the Blues, scoring his only goal on his debut at home to Morecambe on the opening day of last season. Former Blues striker and lifelong Town fan Macauley Bonne rejoined the Addicks in January after leaving QPR and has made seven starts and eight sub appearances, scoring two goals, both in the last three games. Bonne spent last season at Portman Road, having been with his hometown club as a schoolboy, making 32 starts and 14 sub appearances, scoring 12 goals. Blues left-back Penney, ineligible for this weekend’s match, joined the Addicks on loan in January and has made three starts and two sub appearances. Saturday’s late replacement referee, the initially slated official James Bell having been moved due to his support of Sheffield Wednesday, is Sam Barrott, who has shown 103 yellow cards and eight red in 38 games so far this season. The West Riding-based official will be refereeing Town for the fourth time having taken charge of the 1-1 draw at Cambridge in February in which he awarded the U’s a penalty after George Edmundson had clumsily felled Conor McGrandles, which Walton saved. Barrott also booked Edmundson, Morsy and two home players. He was also the man in the middle for the opening game of the season, the home game with Bolton Wanderers, which also ended 1-1, and in which he gave the Trotters a penalty, which was converted by Aaron Morley, after debutant Davis had tripped Conor Bradley. Lee Evans, Woolfenden and two visitors were booked. Barrott was also in charge of Town boss McKenna’s first match in charge, the 1-0 home victory over Wycombe Wanderers at Portman Road in December 2021 in which he booked Morsy, Pigott, Matt Penney and one Chairboy. Squad from: Walton, Hladky, Clarke, Donacien, Woolfenden, Keogh, Burgess, Burns, Jackson, Vincent-Young, Davis, Leigh, Morsy, Luongo, Ball, Humphreys, Camara, Chaplin, Broadhead, Harness, Edwards, Aluko, Ladapo, Hirst.
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